The Fires that Burned Within You
by Hedgi
Summary: One moment she was fine, and Cisco could almost forget about the vibe he saw. And then she starts to seize, and the world shatters around him again. All that matters is Caitlin, and her last, firmest request, the necklace sitting over her heart. Reaction fic to 3x18. Death, Cisco PoV, introspection


Title from Karine Polwart's "Light on the Shore"  
Epigraph from Mary Oliver.

* * *

 _To live in this world_

 _you must be able_

 _to do three things:_

 _to love what is mortal;_

 _to hold it_

 _against your bones knowing_

 _your own life depends on it;_

 _and, when the time comes to let it go,_

 _to let it go._

 _~ Mary Oliver, In Blackwater Woods_

* * *

The Fires that Burn[ed] Within You

The beeping, echoing like an erratic heartbeat in his ears, fades out. For a moment, he can almost believe it's because he's made it soften so he can focus on her face, her too-still form, focus on saving her. He knows it must still be going, drawn out in one long whine. It is too machine to be a keen of grief, but that is what it feels like.

 _Caitlin, Caitlin no, stay with us, come back, come back,_ he thinks but does not say. It takes too much effort to form the thoughts, second nature and desperate, into human language, to shape them. They would feel too heavy on his tongue.

How can this be happening? One moment she was healing, she was fine, teasingly bitter about lime JellO and now this. He has grown too used to having warning before disaster, having build up, seeing the future before the tidal wave crashes down around them. There was no time to brace, not for this, no time to brace for Dante, no time to brace as suddenly cortex computers screamed, years ago, that the world was going to end, and Ronnie took off running. There should have been some sign. He should have seen it, why did the world not turn blue around him when his hand touched hers? If he had moved a little faster, maybe he could have prevented all of this.

But there's no time for regret. Like before, that will come later. Now, they have to take whatever chance they have.

His hands shake, holding the oxygen mask in place, but nothing happens. He can hear the crack of a rib, Julian trying to force her heart to pump blood, but he's too far removed from it, from him. All that exists is Caitlin's face: too pale, too slack. He can feel the others speaking, HR, Julian, but their words don't mean anything, just vibrations. Caitlin cannot hear them. Neither can he.

His hands move without direction as the noise from the monitors continues, as if his own voice, dropping and raising up to his face in shock, in sorrow, pushing back his hair as if that alone can change everything. It cannot. They fall again, trembling so hard that all he can do is press callused palms together, lace his fingers like stitches that can hold together the torn edges of his world.

 _Dios te salve, Maria. Llena eres de gracia: El Seńor es contigo. Bendita tú eres entre todas las mujeres. Y bendito es el fruto de tu vientre: Jesús. Santa María, Madre de Dios, ruega por nosotros pecadores, ahora y en la hora de nuestra muerte._

He can't make his lips move. He can't give voice to the long-memorized prayer, his throat closing around the words, the second prayer of _Caitlin wake up Caitlin don't be dead not you too please please please._

His eyes burn and blur, turning the harsh light of the medbay soft. It almost looks holy, everything white and bleached and she would hate it. He feels as if he can't breathe, his legs liquid under him, and he doesn't know how he's still standing. His heart, no scars from shredding, not in this timeline, beats too loudly, staccato over the mournful wail that won't stop, the machines crying out for him.

This is not right. This is like standing in the pipeline entryway, the door closing too quickly, like standing in the pipeline itself watching Eddie's white shirt stain. This is not how the story is meant to go. This is not how any of their story is supposed to be. How can this be what kills Caitlin? Caitlin, who survived Snart and Rory and their bomb, who survived Grodd three times over, who survived a killer with her own face. Caitlin, who survived Zoom and his deepest betrayal. How can she die here, on a hospital bed, hours after the danger should have passed? Not even from the wound itself, but aftermath. Fallout.

Julian and HR might as well not be there, specters, ghosts, figures in a vibe, as he looks at his best friend. Ronnie is gone. Laurel is gone, and Kendra, though he hardly knew her, Cindy may very well never return. Barry has been drawing away, inch by inch and doubt by doubt, since even before the singularity. Wells never truly cared, wearing another man's face. His brother is dead and still his mother's golden martyr. Caitlin was all that was left intact, spiderweb cracks in a pane of glass still held together-and now, shattered, too. A blood clot, a thrown stone.

Julian moves and he can see it, his mind snapping back into his body, into time that moves correctly, reaching forward just too slow to stop him as he grips the necklace like a parachute pull cord and rips. Cisco's voice tears loose, desperate, angry, broken: _Stop! That's not what she wanted._ Because as much as he wishes he'd had the strength-the weakness- to take the pendant himself, let her body heal, pretend it would all work, he couldn't.

Some things are sacred. Ronnie's order, _two minutes_. Caitlin's clearheaded declaration, courage and fear woven together like a shroud, _I would rather die._ He can't trade her life for her soul. Can't betray her, not like that, as much as it makes him crack down the center. What does that inaction make him? He doesn't know, blindly wrestling the necklace away from Julian and excuses that make too much sense. He has seen too many die. How can he let it happen again, when there is anything else he might have done?

But maybe the question is, how could he do the one thing she begged them not to?

He watches, silent, folding his hands over the necklace, feeling the weight of it. How much does a soul weigh? How heavy is a denied request?

It hadn't broken at the clasp, the one he added because he knew it would help her feel more in control, even if the chain was long enough to slip over her head. The chain itself is snapped, he can feel the broken link against his fingers like rosary beads. Without the circuitry there, it is useless. Just a pretty bauble, nothing more, the light within it dim or gone entirely. All his effort, everything he promised to help her, undone.

She had told him about the promises she'd made and meant, for one more minute with Ronnie. He had not understood fully, then. He does now, and what she had meant afterward, the pain of having lost him after all, his eyes full of flame and not his own. He understands it all, and it his mind knows the feeling of a heart tearing in two. He feels it again, now.

There is nothing to do but watch as her eyes gleam silver, and her power freezes any tears that have failed to fall.

* * *

Come join me in my suffering, leave a comment :)


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